Part 4

Outside

"You didnīt say anything about the package I send you last week." Jarod stared in the sunset over the trees.

"What package?"

"You didnīt get it? A short time ago, I found some stuff from you and your mother in the house where my parents lived. Baby stuff and things like that. There was an armring with your bithday and your name An..."

"Donīt!" she warned him.

"Why, nobodyīs around. No one would hear it."

"Just donīt!" she said, and she sounded again like the hunter Parker.

"Ok, as you wish. There were photos of you, too. I think your mom had found my parents already when she wanted to free me and the others from the Centre."

"She.... she knew who your parents were? But how, and why..." Miss Parker was stunned.

"I donīt know. Perhaps she found the parents of the other kids, too."

"Do you think, I mean, do you believe they killed her because..." she began, and trailed off. "Wait, if she knew who your parents were, why didnīt they do anything?"

He smiled wryly. "Thatīs what I want to know, too. I...." he started, but he couldnīt say anything more. He breathed hard and went on. "Your mom must have met them and hid some private things because she know they were safe there."

"That sounds logical. Well, as logical as something like that could sound."

"Here." He pulled a photo out of his briefcase. "Lovely. I like that photo. Thatīs why I kept it by myself." he showed her a picture of a really sweet baby.

"Is that me?" she asked and took it from his hand.

"I think so."

"I donīt know what to say." She said, and gave it back to him.

"No, you should keep it," he said. She looked in his briefcase where a photo of his mom and Kyle was.

"No, please keep it for me," she said. "And now enough sentimentality. Letīs go back and eat something. Iīm starving."

When they climbed the stairs to the balcony she smelled something good.

"Great, food!"

In the kitchen, Mulder was carefully taking a casserole out of the oven and Scully was standing and talking on her cell-phone

"I canīt tell you where we are, mom. Letīs say itīs a vacation. Yes, Mulderīs here too. ....Yes, AD Skinner knows about .... he offered us some free time...... NO, mom, how could you...." Mulder looked at her and could see her blush. "No, mom, weīre not.... Ok, bye then."

"I hate it when she talks to me like that." Scully put the phone back in her jeans. "She asked if we have "fun" together."

"Sheīs just teasing. She knows me, doesnīt she?" Mulder put the meal on the table and saw Jarod and Miss Parker enter the kitchen.

"You hungry? But I must warn you, Mulder cooked.." Scully asked, and gave him a smile.

"Ha, ha." He grinned back. "Iīm not that bad of a cook."

"I must say it smells good." Jarod said, full innocent as though he didnīt get the little joke.

This time Miss Parker couldnīt hide her grin.

"Hey, youīre feeling better, huh? I saw you smile." Mulder teased.

Miss Parker turned to Scully. "How do you endure him all day?"

"Oh, itīs not that easy but I learned how to live with it." She leaned a little closer and whispered loud enough to be sure he could understand her, too.

"I learned how to deal with him. Sometimes I just let him go, but other times he needs a strong kick in the ass. Thatīs why they sent me to him and it works."

"Isnīt she lovely to me?" Mulder walked past Miss Parker and feigned a soft hit in Scully's ribcage. "Letīs eat before it goes cold."

When they had finished and cleaned the kitchen, Mulder and Scully sat down in the living room and played a kind of card-game Jarod did not know. He and Parker watched the first few rounds and then played with them. It was poker.

"You know the rules, Jarod?" Scully gave the cards.

"I think so." he replied.

"Iīll bet." Miss Parker held her cards and was surprised at what good ones she had.

Neither of them won more or less and Jarod was not as good as Miss Parker suspected. She was about to ask him "What happened to wonder-boy?" when he sighed and said good-night for today. She was really tired herself and went with him.

"īNight."

"īNight" Mulder and Scully wanted to play on a while. Both had won four games and they wanted to find out who was better.

When she opened her door, Jarod was standing beside her, leaning against the doorframe.

"`Night" she said, and wanted to enter but felt his hand softly stroke her cheek.

"Donīt!" she said, and pushed his hand away.

"Why?" He sounded like a little kid whose toy you just took away.

"Itīs not that simple. Do you think, just because I havenīt hissed at you or shot at you while we were here, I forgot everything that happened before?"

"What happened before? Your father gave you only one choice. Bring me back or you could never leave the Centre, isnīt that the truth?"

"I canīt forget who we are!"

"Who are we?" He came more closer and stood only a few inches in front of her. "Tell me who I am. Thatīs what I've been searching for my whole life."

She looked him in the eyes and for the first time for a long time she was the one that looked away first - very un-Parker like.

When she looked up again she saw him staring at her. Her eyes, then her lips. <This is becoming dangerous,> her inner alarm system began to yell.

She had never seen him looking at her like this before.

"Jarod," she sighed. She gathered all her courage together. "I thank you for saving my life, but leave it that way."

"Is this how you feel? Weīre just taking a break from our "normal" lives?"

<No, I donīt know right now what to think!> she thought. He was looking at her lips again. <Please, donīt let him kiss me right now. I donīt know what Iīll do then...>

"Yes," she answered, and before he could do or say something she walked inside and shut the door in his face.

"That was close," she whispered and leaned against the door and felt the first tears run down her check right where he had touched her a few minutes before.

He was the only person that made her cry besides her mom and her dad, and she hated him for that. She hated to cry and to feel vulnerable.

As she slowly sank to the floor, she heart him slam the front door and she cried even more.

<Why canīt we be just like normal people?>

Jarod hurried past Mulder and Scully through the living room outside.

He was angry and sad at the same time. On the balcony he hit a beam hard with his fist but couldnīt feel the pain directly so he hit it again and again untill it hurt.

He ran away, not knowing what to do. "Why does everything have to end like this? Why do all the people that mean so much to me get hurt? Why do I hurt them?" his mind raced. The picture of his mother, crying at the cab and Kyle dyine in the van came like flashes in his mind.

He ran twice around the lake, until his rage was gone - rage against himself. He slowed down when he reached the cabin. The light in the living room was still on. <They never go to bed, heh?>

Then he saw a shadow on the roof besides. The cabin was built next to a little hill, so the roof connected with the gound beside it.

Jarod walked around up the little hill and onto the roof where he sat down beside her. She looked silently up to the sky. It was clear, and the sky had more stars than he had ever seen. The moon was full and lit all the area.

He could see that she had cried. Her eyes were wet and swollen but she still looked beautiful to him.

"Sorry, I didnīt want to...." he started, but she cut him off, looking directly in his eyes.

"You donīt have to be sorry. Iīm the one who should be."

"No more sorrows. Swear it. You have to hold your life in your own hands. You just did as your father said. Free yourself from his power!"

"Thatīs not that easy...."

"Yes it is. Look what Iīve done. I came out of the Centre not knowing what to expect. Sometimes it was and is scary but better to be free and make mistakes than be imprisoned forever. Please try it. If not for you, for the people who care about you."

"I have no one who cares for me." She was getting angry. How dared he to talk to her like that?

"Yes you have." He took her face in his hands. "Sydney cares a lot about you...and so do I. Perhaps just because we grew up together; but do you believe I would have helped you just because we knew each other as kids? Iīm a Pretender: I know exactly how you feel, and it hurt me like it hurts you."

She freed herself of him and stood up. "Stop that shit, Jarod. Leave me alone! You caused all my problems. If my mother hadnīt tried to save you, she could still be alive, I could live a normal life and everything could be ok!" she screamed, caught between rage and crying.

That hit him like a shot right in the heart, and he turned to the wall and hit it like the beam before. "Shit! Shit! Shit!"

Miss Parker was scared as she saw him in such a fury. She had never seen him like this before and she began to regret the words she said to him.

"Please stop. Youīre hurting yourself." She was standing out of his reach.

"Who cares?"

"Me!" Then, she walked behind him and held his arm before he could hit the wall again. He crossed his arms before his chest and she embraced him from behind as he began to sob. She held him that way a long time, until he turned in the embrance and held her even tighter. He buried his face in her neck as she had as she soothed him by slowly rubbing his back.

When he slowly pulled away, she looked at him with so much ... what was that in her eyes . ... sympathy .. or something else?

End part 4